The Lansing Star Online is a Web-only newspaper. If you are thinking of submitting an article to the Lansing Star please take a moment to review these brief guidelines (below). What We Accept

We DO accept articles and columns from volunteer writers, and press releases that are written in news story form. The Lansing Star's beat is Lansing, NY including the Town and Village of Lansing, New York. But we also cover Ithaca and Tompkins County, especially in our Business, Around Town, and Entertainment sections. Please keep this in mind when submitting items to us. We will rarely feature an item as a story if it is not about local people, places, and organizations, or Tompkins County businesses, theaters, galleries, etc.

If you think we are in Michigan, please do not submit!

We DO NOT accept announcements of events as stories. Please do not confuse news stories with announcements. We will not run announcements on our content pages (unless they are paid announcements -- see below). However, if you are planning an event we do accept stories about it if written according to our guidelines. We prefer to cover events when they take place, but if there is a news-worthy story about the preparation of an event we may consider running it. For instance you might send a piece on the creation of floats for a parade, or some other angle that would be interesting to readers.

All Stories

See the other pages on this site for news article and press release writing hints.

General:

Stories must be a minimum of three or four short paragraphs.

Maximum size equals about two pages in Word, or about 20 short paragraphs. *

All stories have a small square picture at the top or a business envelope-shaped 600 pixel wide picture at the top. If possible send one that can be sized by us.

Pictures

Our two most common picture sizes at the top of each article are 120x120 pixel icon pictures and 600 pixel wide by variable height (the shape of a business envelope) JPG PNG or GIF images. Pictures in the body of articles are 600 pixels by whatever the height turns out to be, usually around 400 pixels high. We accept images right out of the camera, and we generally do size and edit most of the pictures submitted.

We do prefer to run pictures with stories. If possible please send a few. DO NOT send pictures in a Word file -- DO send them as separate attachments to your email. DO send captions at the bottom of your article, either in a Word file or in your email. Do NOT send us a link to a gallery. Do NOT send more than three pictures without prior permission. It is OK to send pictures right out of the camera, or cropped and edited. We need all pictures to be a minimum of 600 pixels wide (height variable). We will edit pictures for size. **

* As online publications we do not have the space limitations print newspapers have. However, if a story is too long and/or if paragraphs are too long people will lose interest. Remember, start each story with a strong lead paragraph, and answer who, what, where, when, and how. Don't put in 'too much information.'

** You must be the photographer or copyright owner of pictures you send for publication. We accept pictures in JPG, GIF, and PNG format. We do not download pictures from links you send us.

News Stories

Tell about local people, places, organizations or events

Make the first paragraph the most interesting to draw readers to read the rest

Tell who, what, where, when, why and how

Readers love facts and figures and statistics.

Include a picture or two if you can

Avoid hype (don't use exclamation points!!!) and advertising language

When referring to people use their full name the first time, and then only use their last name. Exceptions: use first names for children below teenage, and use first names if your story has two people that share a last name

Include quotations if you can. Quotes give your story a face and lend credence to what you are reporting on.

When using quotation marks ONLY use double quotes ( " ) for actual quotations from people you are writing about. Use single quotes ( ' ) for everything else, including quotations within quotations. Examples: Johnson said roller derby has the 'cool' factor. "I love when they come around the curves," he said. "When they do people say 'Woah!' and start screaming."

Do not merely announce an event

Do not ask for a response from readers in a news story

Do not "speak" to people you are reporting on. For example do not thank people or offer congratulations. Don't tell them to come to an event.

Write in the third person. DO: "The team clobbered the competition." DON'T: "We killed them in the 9th inning."

Don't use ALL CAPS in any words except acronyms (like TCCOG). And when using acronyms spell out the full title with the acronym after it in parentheses. Example: 'Board of Education (BOE)'

Spell out numbers below 10 like one or seven. Otherwise use numbers: 23, not 'twenty-three'.

If a press release is submitted in the form of a news story (see above) we will consider it for publication.

We are a small newspaper trying to survive by selling ads to provide quality local news to our readers, and 'gimmes' -- announcements of events or programs that ask for a reader response -- compete with our ad sales, therefore we are unable to publish these releases.

We do offer our free events calendar and a very reasonable paid announcement option for non-profits (see below).

Announcements by non-profits and municipalities can be placed in content areas (where news stories are) a weekly fee. Examples are job openings, municipal or public meetings, or items for sale. These are clearly labeled as "paid."

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Important Information

Deadlines The deadline for each Friday issue is Wednesday midnight for columns, and Thursday noon for sports stories. Exceptions may be made for late breaking news and sports at the editor's discretion.

Press Releases Press releases in the form of a news story may be used in the content pages with attribution to the submitter or their organization. Always assume we want pictures, especially with arts (including theater) releases. Don't say 'Photos available' -- just send them to us please.

Bylines: We credit the sender as the author unless requested not to. Also, if you send a story that mentions you or quotes yourself we credit 'Staff' in the byline unless otherwise requested.

Announcements: Press releases that are announcements will not be used -- please enter them directly in our Events Calendar if appropriate.

Materials are accepted or rejected at the sole discretion of the Lansing Star staff. Occasional exceptions to these policies do not imply a change of policy. Please do not ask for exceptions.Volunteer Writers: The Star has a cadre of volunteer writers of all ages who are interested in reporting stories or writing columns. If you are interested in writing a regular column please contact us .

Submitting Your Article

Please put your article in the body of an e-mail or a Microsoft Word .doc file and email it to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Copyright/Permissions

By submitting to the Lansing Star you are affirming that you own the rights to content, including pictures and text that you submit.

If you are submitting pictures of minors be sure you have a parent or guardian's permission for an image of their child to be posted in an Internet newspaper. Click here for a model release you can use.

Letters to the Editor

We accept most of the Letters to the Editor that we receive for publication on our Opinions Page unless they are deemed to hurt children, attack a local business, are a personal attack, or are for the sole purpose of promoting an event (please consider advertising your event with us, and also place it in our events calendar). Letters are published at the sole discretion of the Editor.